9:05 remaining, first half: Moments after he’d nailed his fourth consecutive jumpshot, Michigan freshman backup guard Spike Albrecht threw himself to the floor in pursuit of a rebound that had bounced wildly away from Louisville guard Russ Smith’s missed layup. When Albrecht wound up in possession of the ball, instead of calling timeout to preserve the possession he heaved it forward to center Mitch McGary, who drove to the lane and then kicked the ball to the right corner to shooter Nik Stauskas. When Stauskas nailed a 3-pointer to make it 25-17—that was Stauskas’ only three of the game—the Wolverines had broken away from a close game and were on their way toward building a 12-point advantage.

Louisville's Luke Hancock hit four-straight three-pointers to close a big first-half gap and give the Cardinals the momentum they needed to clinch the victory over Michigan. (AP photo)

:59 remaining, first half: Cardinals wing Luke Hancock had nailed three consecutive 3-pointers that cut his team’s deficit to four points in a little more than a minute. The last of those came when no one picked him up in transition, which was nearly as inexplicable as the decision by UM reserve center Jordan Morgan a minute later to turn and recover toward his man after the Cardinals had set a ball screen for Hancock. That’s right. After Hancock had made three in a row, Morgan worried not about the hottest player in the arena but instead turned away from the ball and retreated to pick up Gorgui Dieng, who’d already attracted the attention of a solid rotation from freshman Glenn Robinson. Wolverines frosh Caris LeVert didn’t have time to get back into the play before Hancock fired, and that 3-pointer made it a 36-35 game.

9:11 remaining, second half: Having already cost Trey Burke a least a dozen minutes of first-half playing time by pump-faking him into the air and drawing his second personal, Hancock used his guile to pull the same trick on McGary. At the top of the key, Hancock pump-faked on a three and McGary barreled into him; it was his fourth foul. McGary wound up missing 11 minutes of the second half, and the Wolverines dearly missed his physical presence beneath the goal.

“Luke has the ability to do that,” Michigan coach John Beilein said. “Taking Mitch out of the game at that point, the big difference was a couple of those offensive put-backs they got late in the game. When Mitch is out there, he’s a difference-maker.”

5:09 remaining, second half: Louisville led by only three points when Albrecht missed a jump shot and Chane Behanan rebounded for the Cardinals, then threw a two-hand outlet pass toward a streaking Peyton Siva. As Siva drove toward a layup down the right side, Burke quickly closed the gap up the center of the lane. Siva lifted the ball to release it, but Burke elevated directly beside him and stuffed the shot with no apparent contact. At least, that’s how it looked to those of us watching from courtside, and to many watching on television, and to the analysts calling the game.

"From everything else we’ve seen, that’s a play-on, clearly,” CBS’ Clark Kellogg said. Official Tony Greene blew his whistle and called Burke for a foul. When Siva converted the two free throws, the life was gone from UM’s comeback attempt.

“I thought it looked pretty clean from where I was sitting,” Stauskas said. “Trey got up on it. Even looking at the replay, it looked like he went straight up and got the ball. The refs are going to call whatever they see, and obviously they thought it was a foul. That’s a huge moment in the game. The fact that they got two free throws off that, and we could have possibly went back and scored, that’s a four or five-point swing. It’s obviously a huge part of the game.”